I have been dreaming of a garage for a number of years and have finally decided to jump in with both feet. I want to keep it close to the house but despite having almost ten acres to work with, between the driveway configuration property line, septic tank and drain fields, a creek and a pond the placement is challenging. It will be slightly offset from the house but have a covered, short breezeway that will connect it to the porch of the house. I'll will also extend the porch and wrap it slightly around the side of the house.
We will build a three car with a bonus room/guest quarters above.
I want to keep the stairs inside and will have one bay with a cathedral ceiling to allow for a full height car lift for working and storing cars...basically giving me a 4 car garage.
After months of searching pictures of what we want we have decided on the below garage for inspiration. Our house is log siding so we will use the same siding as the house; rock work will be similar as will the shed dormer. I will do most of the work myself but will hire the concrete work out (poured my LAST concrete a few years back on a sidewalk project for my mother-in-law) and hire another carpenter and helper to speed it up.
We are basically working off of this picture and will figure the interior configuration after the slab goes in. I will use engineered trusses; they specified three glue lam beams for the front wall to span the 40' and carry the top floor...those damn things are EXPENSIVE!!
I'll try to keep it updated with each stage and will probably ask for a lot of suggestions along the way. It will be fun to see how close I can get to the original inspiration picture and still stay within budget.
